When a baby is in our lives... ...

The past few days have been tiring for our family.

Awesome news is my sis in law gave birth to a lovely baby girl... my first niece. The first baby who would be calling me gugu. ♡ Already loving her so much... already finding myself smiling at her lovely face in the photograph.
A newborn is always a worry on his/her parents' minds. Is my baby healthy? Why does my baby cry so much? Is my baby getting enough milk? How's my baby's jaundice level like? And the list goes on. I personally feel that the first month is always very tough - having to deal with worries about the baby, coping with him/her while trying to get enough rest and recover. And of course, if there's hired help in the form of a confinement nanny, manage the helper as well.

And above all this, stay afloat and support each other through the journey of parenthood. Emotions can run wild and I know how freaking crazy it can get! Omg. I was one happy mama all the way until week 2 into confinement when I would cry very easily and for a long time. Wah scared my mum and hubby, man! Haha!

So I hope that my Bro and sis-in-law could settle down and get used to their new routines and also be able to enjoy their newborn. :)

For my side, Ethan was down with a cold. Felt so bad because he was out and about for bulk of the week and it could have been a mixture of over exposure + exhaustion + never wear enough clothes. :(

Feel so bad that I didn't take care of him well enough and it hurts to see him struggle to breath through his stuffy nose. Lesson learnt!

So because of his cold, he couldn't eat or rest well so he was a lil more fussy and cranky than usual. He woke up more during the nights and needed more attention in the day so I didn't really get to rest sufficiently. But really, I've never found myself so OKAY with such situations except for when I've become a mother. ♡

So let's just look fwd to a better week ahead. Life goes on and it will only get better! :)

3 Months: My pair of little hands

At 15 weeks old, Ethan can hold onto round things pretty well!

We gave him a plastic ball on Friday, expecting it to slip out of his hand but to our surprise, he held on to it pretty well! :)

He can now reach out to grab the dangling toys from his gym and hold it with two hands. He also loves to study his hands and fingers and put them together near his chest.

Most of all, he has learnt to appreciate his fist pretty well, often choosing to have a private feast on his own. Haha.

Hungry... put into his mouth.
Sleepy... put into his mouth.
Bored... put into his mouth.
Selfie... put into his mouth.

Bathing Hero

The little one would usually make a little noise or wail when we bathe him but today.... achievement unlocked! No crying when bathing. It was an enjoying bathing session for baby and I. :)

Let's do a fist pump, mummy! ♡

Ethan's First / Full Month Celebration with ecreative

Thinking that Ethan would arrive in mid Jan or earlier, we planned to throw a party for him to celebrate his first month. I looked into possible venues, caterer and decorations and was really excited about everything. Came 15 Jan - Nothing. 16... 17... 18... still nothing! By then I had given up hope on throwing a party as our guests would be too busy to join in the celebration since it is on the 2nd day of Chinese New Year. As such, we decided to just give out cakes to announce and celebrate Ethan's birth.

We decided that we wanted to give out red eggs as that would be the best symbol of why we are even giving out anything - to announce and celebration a baby's birth. And we also decided to give out cakes instead of something unconventional such as cookies and durian puffs which I would love to have, but may not be well received by every one.

Price was also a very important factor as we had to give the packages to our families, relatives, friends and colleagues, so we wanted something that is presentable and yet not too damaging on our wallets. Of course, even with an attractive tag, it's very important that the items have to be reasonably tasty.

We did quite a lot of ding-donging around as we were met with some restrictions with our initial choices and we finally settled on ordering from ecreative and I must say it's not bad at all!

What we like:
- affordable packages starting from $5.90 (GST not included)

- it is Halal certified so we could give it to our Muslim friends too.

- friendly and helpful staff! I was served by Ruz via the phone and she was patient and polite even though I made some changes to my initial orders.

- clarity and efficiency. I received my invoice via email very quickly and it's important to me as I dislike being left hanging wondering if my order got through or if the order has been keyed in correctly or not.

- presentable packaging. It arrived in big lovely boxes which are sleek and cute. Totally exceeded my expectations.

- it is near to our home so we could do self collection easily so that only fresh products are distributed out.

- the food items are fresh and quite tasty. We selected cupcakes and they were soft and fluffy. The cream wasn't the best tasting but it was fine. The donuts also tasted good, not dense and stale. We were also happy that the red eggs were evenly dyed!

What we didn't really like:
- I didn't like and wasn't comfortable that I had to give my credit card details to the service staff over the phone. I would appreciate a more secured way of making payment.

- the cream could be make tastier by making it more buttery.

- the cupcakes were not all evenly made. Some had more cake and some lesser. Those lesser were levelled by putting in more cream but I didn't enjoy having so much cream in my cupcake. Less cream more cake, pls!

- ecreative gave us a lot of plastic bags which I think is meant for us to put the boxes of goodies in. But the plastics bags were not exactly the nicest looking around. To be frank, the box itself is quite sturdy so I don't think there's need for those extra plastic bags.

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On the whole, we are happy with ecreative, especially with regard to the box packaging. It would be even better of they could make slight improvements based on what we observed.

The two firsts.

Yesterday (27th Feb) was the first time I brought Ethan out to a mall on my own! We went to meet my colleagues for lunch at the nearby mall and man, did it take much planning for the whole day just to make sure that I would be on time for the appointment. Haha!

It was slightly stressful, ensuring that the little one got his feed and nap so that he wouldn't fret during the lunch date and I'm glad it all worked out well! My colleagues had a good time playing with Ethan and seeing how Clara took wefie with my boy reminded me that I rarely have photos taken with Ethan! How can!!!? Haha his precious moments without me in the picture??? Hahaha...

Achievement on bringing kid to the mall alone checked! Next achievement would be to take lots a wefie with the little boy.



The hubby and I had the opportunity to catch the Chingay 2015 live and we made the decision to watch the parade together as we know we won't get to have much time together, much less date time, with baby Ethan around. So after lunch with my colleagues, I went home and it was another round of big plans waiting to be executed. I was pretty worried that he would be hungry fast so I gave my mum an extra bottle of milk. The last thing I wanted was for my mum to call me because of a wailing hungry baby.

We had fun at the parade. It's our first time out on our own without the little boy and it's a good time off for us both. Of course, the anxious mummy in me couldn't help but dropped my mum a few messages asking about the boy.

Here's our little one sleeping soundly at my mum's:



The hubby and I tend to want to retreat I to our own little world whenever we have a little free time when Ethan is sleeping. Both of us would be on our phones or iPad or we would be doing our housework and attending to other commitments. While I think it's not exactly good for our relationship if this continues for a long time, I think it's a necessary stage where we get used to the new routine and added responsibilities as new parents. I think it's important that we have some 'me' time away from everything and just cater to our own needs. Our first date without Ethan is a good big step into tuning back into couple-time so I'm absolutely looking forward to our next date together. AND IT'S COMING SOON! :)